MAKE MINE A STIFF SPLIFF...

Ros WynneJones visits the pub where a Cabinet Minister's son sealed a
cannabis deal

IN ONE of London's most ordinary middleclass pubs last night, people of
all ages were celebrating the twilight time between Christmas and New Year.
They sat at neat tables, chatted with bar staff and joked about escaping
their inlaws.

Most people in the pub would not have known that the friendly, warmlylit
premises were the subject of a police investigation which cuts to the heart
of government. For it was here, not in some dingy den of vice, that the now
infamous Cabinet Minister's son made the mistake of buying cannabis for an
attractive young woman who turned out to be a tabloid reporter.

One can only imagine what Christmas must have been like at the senior
minister's house. As the Government tried, in the face of increasing
pressure from backbenchers and campaigners, to hold its tough line on not
decriminalising cannabis, the 17yearold who cannot be named for legal
reasons had laid bare the nearimpossibility of toeing that particular
line, simply by acting like a typical sixthformer.

The minister's son now faces a charge for supplying drugs. What he is
actually guilty of is knowing where to buy cannabis resin, an
easilyavailable drug which is nonaddictive, and selling a small amount,
1.92 grams, to someone looking for it.

"People are making out the guy is some sort of bigtime drugs criminal,"
says Ben, 21, who regularly buys cannabis in the same neighbourhood as the
minister's son. "It doesn't work like that at all. What usually happens is
that people who buy cannabis get some in for their friends and then sell it
on for no profit. They buy from a smalltime guy who just deals a bit of
dope. The bigger dealers are way up the network."

To buy the Class B drug in the 1990s, says Ben, there is no need to go to a
"dodgy pub up a back alley. In most pubs in bigger cities it is easily
available."

The story, which led to the formal arrest of the 17yearold on Tuesday,
began with a tipoff to the Mirror that he was dealing cannabis at a pub.
Two female reporters then went to the pub on a Saturday night. They got
chatting to the minister's son, shared a few drinks and then the talk
turned to drugs. They talked about festivals and raves, gossiped about
cokesniffing celebrities and discussed the merits of cannabis leaves
(grass) and resin. The son then said a friend had some cannabis to sell and
he would "see what [he] could do".

"Ten minutes later," according to reports in the Mirror, "the politician's
son returned, tapped [the reporter] on the shoulder and asked her to go
outside with him. Then, opposite a magistrates' court and near a police
station, he offered her a clear plastic bag, saying it contained 'good,
strong hash' and took £10 for it."

The Mirror contacted the Labour minister, an awkward phone call bearing in
mind the traditional loyalties of the newspaper, and the politician decided
to take his son to the police station, where he was arrested. The son has
since had to name the dealer from whom he bought the cannabis, and his
friends have been questioned by police. As well as the formal police
charges and the possibility of expulsion from school, like other
17yearolds who have misbehaved, he has been grounded.

The Mirror has handed over the "good, strong hash" and the reporter is to
give a statement to police tomorrow. The Prime Minister has said there is
no question of the minister being asked to resign, although some
backbenchers have said that if the son is treated any differently from any
other 17yearold, the minister's position will become untenable.

Police have been told to tie up the investigation "as soon as is humanly
possible" and the Crown Prosecution Service should decide early next week
between a caution and a charge, which would result in court proceedings.

Fortunately for the family concerned, because he is under the age of 18 he
cannot be named unlike Lord Steel's son, Graeme, who was freed from a
jail sentence for growing cannabis in 1996.

In the wake of the arrest of the Minister's son, Lord Steel added his voice
to the growing call for a debate on the decriminalisation of cannabis. "It
will be a rude shock to the Minister, and colleagues should rethink the
policy," he said. "There's a good case for an independent inquiry."